Issue
Understanding academic honesty is an important part of any course and Pamoja upholds strict standards where this is concerned. Students need to understand the potential ramifications for any incident of academic malpractice.
Rationale
All Pamoja students complete basic training on academic honesty underlining its importance, what constitutes malpractice and the consequences of being found guilty of committing malpractice. Teachers play a key role in the malpractice procedure and clear guidance is therefore required.
Action
Attached to this SOP is an 'Academic Honesty Process' flow diagram which shows the steps to be taken where a teacher suspects malpractice.
The teacher should initially check the student's SIS profile for any information that may contribute to their understanding of the situation. A message should then be sent to School Services indicating the suspected malpractice and reasons for it.
The teacher should request an explanatory statement from the student which will be passed onto School Services.
School Services then share the issue with the SBC/Principal at the school who will deal with the case in line with their own internal academic honesty policy.
The SBC will add their own statement to the student's and return the form to School Services for final sign off by the Principal of Online Courses.
Where malpractice is found, this will be recorded on the student's SIS profile.
Further cases of malpractice will result in harsher sanctions. The attached document, 'IB- Academic Honesty Procedure', outlines the full policy for IB courses. The attached document, 'CAIE- Academic Honesty Procedure', outlines the full policy for Cambridge International courses.